My No shopping update and lessons learned.

You may remember in January and February I had fun pretending we were unable to shop and trying to use what we already had instead of buying anything. (Like the Ingalls during the hard winter.) It was my goal to do that until May like the Ingalls had too but we never were able to do it perfectly and some things came about that caused me to quit my little pretending.

1. Life got busy- The kids and I headed off to Iowa with my parents for my Grandma's funeral and though we actually bought very little on our trip (we were able to pack the majority of our food), I was not able to get the fridge prepared enough with food that Ken liked and so he did a fair amount of shopping for convenience foods while I was gone. As soon as we got home we had a houseful of company and then after that I was sick for around 2 weeks and meanwhile Ken did more shopping of convenience foods just to keep the family fed while I lay on the couch. (My mom and sister were also great to take care of us during that time!)
2. My parents and my Mother-in-law questioned the wisdom of getting too low on food supplies especially during this time when gas prices are rising (which will lead to higher food prices). They were concerned that I might run us completely out of things like oil/fats which are rather necessary. Though we still had a lot of food- Ken and I did see wisdom in their council and so I have decided to start stocking up again. I placed an order with Azure Standard (to get my oatmeal and such) and after finding a good deal on Coconut oil at Vitacoast I stocked up on that as well. (I was able to get $10 off as I was a first time customer. You can too if you use this link and if you do I will also be rewarded.)
3. We are close to running out of things that are essentials- like veggies. So shopping soon was going to have to happen anyway. We still have not bought any pasta or chocolate chips or white sugar or flour. The pasta and chocolate chips have been missed a bit but we are surviving. :-)

One of our meals using what we had- Liver, Oven Fries, Cabbage Salad and Sunflower seeds that I roasted myself.

 I did have fun during this whole process (though when I got sick I simply did not have the energy to try to keep it up any longer) and I think I have learned from it.

During this process I have.....

• Really made an effort to use tallow in my cooking/baking and have found that I like it quite a lot in somethings. This is nice because as we are able to get as a part of the 1/2 beef that we get (grass fed and finished, hormone free and raised naturally) it is basically "free". It is also what I consider to be a healthy fat.
• Used up most of the odds and ends of foods that we had in our cupboards or freezers that I had been avoiding.
• Become more aware of the things that are "essentials" and the things that we might enjoy but can actually get by without pretty easily.
• Become more excited about the idea of living on less in many areas of our life. I feel I learned some about living more simply and have worked to get rid of clutter in many more areas than just food.
• Stretched myself in cooking creatively while using just what we had.
• Have enjoyed how much of what we eat has been stuff that we grew or picked or got locally.
• Become more interested in trying to eat locally and shop less all of the time.
• Been very thankful for the bounty that God blesses us with in so many ways! 

Do you grow or raise a lot of your own food? Do you like to have a lot of food stocked up? I would love to hear your thoughts!

My chives are coming up! I am excited about adding them to our diet.